1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to gate valves, and, more particularly, to electromechanically actuable gate valves for use on holding tanks of recreational vehicles.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Holding tanks on mobile homes, campers, and other types of recreational vehicles have been used for many years. However, heretofore, such holding tanks have been drained by hand-operated gate valves. That is, the user of the apparatus has to manually open the gate valve from the exterior of the vehicle and then flush the holding tank from the interior of the vehicle. This requires either two people, one inside and one outside the vehicle, or else one individual must accomplish the task by moving the outside of the vehicle after the gate valve is opened, to the inside of the vehicle to flush the holding tank out, and then moving once again to the outside of the vehicle, after the tank has been fully flushed, in order to manually close the gate valve.
Alternatively, the line is opened until the holding tank is drained, then the valve is closed. The holding tank is refilled by adding water, then the valve is opened to again drain the holding tank. This procedure is repeated until the holding tank is sufficiently clean to allow the addition of appropriate chemicals.
When a recreational vehicle drives into a campground, trailer court, or the like, a connection is usually available to allow drainage of the holding tank. After the connection is made, the gate valve must be opened to allow draining and flushing of the holding tank. Since both opening and closing of the gate valve has heretofore been accomplished manually, there is an added inconvenience when the opening or closing of the valve must be accomplished at night in the dark. The necessity for both manually opening and manually closing the valve is an additional inconvenience.